Previously: The Liars all conveniently worked at a call center which Lucas also conveniently called. He rowed out in the lake with Hanna and was about to tell her something but then she knocked him out with her paddle.
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Let the Water Hold Me Down
Sweeney: The episode begins with Hanna still wet from her time in the lake, looking moodily into a fire. She has a blanket around her and Aria offers to make her soup. Emily says that while Hanna might not be able to talk, the police (LOL) are going to drag the lake. That’s jumping to a pretty morbid conclusion, but I love when these girls support each other in times of trauma (which are always). Hanna’s not buying the morbid conclusion because she can feel that he’s out there.
Aria’s stunned by the idea of Lucas helping A, because he doesn’t seem that violent. This is when Hanna pipes up to out Lucas as destroyer of Ali’s memorial. The girls are mad, but Hanna says she told him she’d keep a secret and he’d been pretty well tormented by Ali. As per the show’s great Hanna/Booze ship, she decides she needs a drink and she starts swigging from her giant bottle without noticing that it’s now full of gross nasty sludge, even though it was in the car during the whole lake fiasco.
Spencer loudly jumps to the conclusion that maybe dead Lucas did it, which moves him very low on my suspect list. They get an A text message saying that it’s “no fun chugging lake water,” advising Hanna to “choke on this bitch.” As if you haven’t tormented this one enough. Make Aria chug lake water!
Lightning cackles. Liars look around. Big Eyes SHHHHH.
The next morning at Marin Manor, Hanna hangs up a call and confirms that Lucas called his parents this morning, though he’s still not home. Mama Marin freaks out, allowing Emily to adorably lie for Hanna about the presence of alcohol at the party. She adds that she needs to call his parents because her daughter hosted a party that their son has yet to return from. AWW! SHE’S SO PRECIOUS! You get them Sandy Cohen eyebrows, girl! Don’t worry, most Traumaland parents don’t notice when their kids go missing for days on end. NBD. She goes on to parent, assuring Hanna that Lucas will talk to her when he’s ready. Emily continues to rock her lying game by insisting that they have to get to Spencer’s before school (LOL) (Sorry, Rosewood’s pretend versions of real things still make me laugh) to prepare for a group presentation.
Lorraine: To her credit, Mama Marin looks after them like, “girls, I KNOW y’all don’t actually school at school.” You are so right, Mama Marin.
Sweeney: At Spencer’s they go through assorted evidence that A left behind of A’s presence. We know how omnipresent A is, so I’d almost buy that A left this shit there to fuck with them. Spencer adds that the lake house is perfect for an evil lair (OR A SNARK HQ?)(S: CALEB INCLUDED?)(L: TOO MUCH MURDER LAKE, THOUGH.) because of how generally unused it goes in the non-summer months. Hanna is extra horrified because there’s a receipt which suggests that A was there when she and Caleb were having sexytimes there. It’s not surprising that A’s a perv. Also, Aria is wearing a stupid outfit that involves a furry maroon vest that is kind of the vest equivalent of a pimp jacket. Definitely Birthday Cake Badging that one, honey.
Lor: Between last week’s, “can’t! Glass in my hair!” and this weeks, “sorry. Lake water in my mouth!” these girls are providing just the kinds of excuses Snark Ladies love.
Sweeney: Later, Aria is complaining to Spencer that her pedophile boyfriend has stopped answering her calls. Just as she’s trying to tell Spencer that she hoped they’d understand that the guy who violated their daughter was SUCH a great dude, she’s interrupted by Holden, he of fatherly approval. He asks Aria out and she says she has to go shave her 32-year-old soul’s hands that night because she’s grounded. Holden awkwardly says her dad said it wouldn’t be a problem. That’s weird, dude. I mean, she is really grounded, but “Your dad says it’s OK” is a weird response to getting your date invite declined. But I really like him anyway! He’s charming and age appropriate! He successfully charms Aria with the line, “We’re both old enough to know the difference.” Ugh.
After he leaves, Aria groans about it being weird, but Spencer thinks it’s super cute because she can be such a fangirl.
Lor: Same maturity level, I’m sure!
Sweeney: Hanna is walking through the halls with Mona who rambles about how annoying Lucas is for ruining the party and some of her latest dramz with Noel. Hanna’s not really listening because trauma. She spots some kid taking her giant Homecoming Queen Portrait off the walls. IDK why that’s a thing, but it is and he tells her it’s a secret, but the administration has issues with pairing tiaras and orange jumpsuits. Criminal charges generally do have a way of stripping one of school privileges in real towns. Mona sticks up for Hanna to that kid, but then gets mad when Hanna has no thoughts on her current Noel drama. I’ll be honest, Mona, I wasn’t really listening to you talk either.
After being chewed out and called selfish (THE FEELSIEST LIAR?) Hanna ducks into the bathroom to cry alone. HUGS. ALL OF THEM. She hears someone come in and tries to pretend nobody’s really there.
Elsewhere in the Rosewood Facility for Plot Exposition, Emily gets a phone call from a creepy voice asking to speak privately with someone who works for the crisis center. It’s just Maya, though, playing a slightly adorable trick. Maya asks if Emily can hook her up with a fake ID, which she can, and will presumably do when they see each other that night for other hooking up.
Back in the bathroom, a voice calls out, “Hello” and Hanna ignores it. She looks down and sees water has overflowed from somewhere, so she begrudgingly leaves the stall. Someone left their weird all-the-sinks in one faucet on, with a wooden toy boat floating in it. Time for a text from A:
After a Not Commercial Break, Spencer and Aria are on their phones. Spencer is looking up the train schedule and Aria is buying tickets for her and Holden to be at a play where she knows that Pedzrafitz will probably also be. She insists that it would mean that ~*fate*~ is involved if they see each other. OK girl. They have to go, though, because the next train leaves in 20 minutes.
Sara: This scene is the best because of how pissed Spencer is that her phone doesn’t get signal as good as Aria’s. She literally demands that Aria change places with her, because there is just no way that Aria has a better phone. Love.
Sweeney: Marin Manor. Caleb says that Lucas called again, but refuses to talk to him, making it crazy awkward for him to stay at that house. Caleb wants to go look for him, and is also positive that Lucas’s “cousin” he’s supposedly staying with is covering for him. Hanna says that there aren’t many places he could go. Caleb suggests the lake house and is weirdly adamant about this in spite of Hanna’s obvious shying away from it. He finally catches on, confirming that she doesn’t want him found, and trying to get her to confess to what happened in the boat. He’s being weirdly aggressive about it and it makes me suspicious. Hanna finally tells him that no one is stopping him, so Caleb storms out. To add to her troubles, Mona texts her that they need to talk.
Philadelphia. The girls are wandering around, confused. They finally identify Smitty’s as a magazine stand. The receipt only reveals that they purchased magazines and gum. Aria then suggests that maybe it was her parents or Melissa whose condo is like 10 blocks from there or any of the thousand logical conclusions one could draw from the presence of a receipt for magazines and gum in the lake house in a world where they aren’t being stalked by a (team of) sociopath(s).
Aria has to go get to her shady date. She asks Spencer if she’s doing the right thing and Spencer foolishly assures her that she is. That your creepy love has the support of another teenager is not a winning endorsement, Aria, even if that teenager is a BAMF.
Once Aria leaves, Spencer spots a blind girl going somewhere and decides to stalk her because of their experience with blind girls being creepy.
Sara: What a strange thing to decide, Spencer, but sure, okay.
Lor: BLIND PEOPLE IN A CITY? A CLUE, A CLUE!
Sweeney: At the call center, Emily is wrapping up her shift and Maya is there. Maya says that Emily is totes the best person to answer calls from troubled people, except if that person is Lucas. They’re about to leave when Maya gets a text from someone that makes her get all shifty. She tells Emily she’ll catch up with her later.
Spencer’s blind girl stalking leads her to a rehabilitation center for blind people. Unclear if they specialize in the creepy kind. Spencer walks in and tries to get info out of the desk lady, but she can’t because confidential. Fortunately, she walks off and a nearby blind kid overheard her asking for Jenna Marshall and nearby blind kid knows her.
Sara: Is that nearby blind kid’s name Contrivance?
Sweeney: Funny you should ask, because yes! I went with “convenient” but those “c” words for making shit up as you go along in order to string the plot together are all the same.
Marin Manor. Hanna’s doing dishes. Maya confesses to Hanna is keeping something from her that is clearly making her upset. She figures she should just ask about it and Hanna has a mini-outburst asking why nobody’s allowed to have a damn secret.
Emily’s afraid it’s an A thing, but Hanna says it could be about a hundred other things and she should just chill out. Hanna finally calms down and confesses about her fight with Caleb, which was only a product of her trying to protect him. She says it sucks being the girlfriend who knows too much, but Em thinks it’s just as bad to be the one who doesn’t know anything.
Blind Rehab Center. Spencer brings tea to the Convenient (for Spencer) Blind Kid (probably not for him). She lies that she knew Jenna pre-Rosewood. Convenient Blind Kid backstories that he had been going blind his whole life and was really angry and bitter when it finally happened but meeting Jenna with her crazy determination to deal with her blindness helped snap him out of it. She’s still terribly creepy, and I doubt her blindness, but if she IS blind, I don’t doubt that she was hardcore enough to kick blind school’s ass. CBK goes on to say that he also finished blind school but now he hangs out there to help other blind kids. His alarm conveniently goes off for him to go to a class. They shake hands and he deduces that her pulse is racing, a trick he learned from Jenna. He adds that Jenna’s special because she’s great at reading people.
Sara: And also great at murdering people and sending anonymous text messages, probably!
Lor: Also, sneaky taking someone’s pulse is REALLY WEIRD, JENNA AND CBK. WTF.
Sweeney: On her way out the door, Spencer is stopped by the front desk lady, telling her that visitors must sign in. The Great Contrivance Spirit whisks her away so that Spencer can run back and steal the visitor log from 2009 and leave just in time to say good night to the returning desk lady.
Marin Manor. Emily is borrowing Aria’s fake ID because that’s the best she can do for Maya on such short notice. LOLOL, Emily. You can’t be serious. But apparently they are going somewhere that doesn’t take laws seriously and it’s not even Rosewood! Hanna’s panicky and locking all the doors as it storms outside, just to fuel her panic. They suggest Mona or Caleb to come over, but those aren’t options because of all the other issues. Both girls adorably offer to cancel their dates for Hanna because they know how lovable that makes them. Hanna assures them that it will be fine.
Aria arrives on her age appropriate date. Her adorable age appropriate date has brought her gummy bears because she used to smuggle them into their age appropriate play dates. She goes to pick up her tickets from will call and also asks about Pedzra’s tickets, which are still there. Just as she turns to walk away, she spots him getting out of a cab. They make eyes at each other and literally slow motion walk to swoony music. I was laughing too hard to be angry. (L: I COULDN’T . EVEN.) This is cut off by Holden, spotting a middle aged woman they both know who also, we find as they go inside, knows Pedzra. So probably keep your illegal love still on the major DL, k?
Sweeney: Even broken up they can’t get this secretive thing right.
That night, Spencer is walking to her car, very antsy. She’s interrupted by Mona who also just rode in from the city, arms full of shopping bags. They chat and eventually Mona comes out with her whole recently dumped sob story (OH! So that’s what she said.) that ends with her buying stupid shit and concluding that Noel must have broke her. Spencer offers her some tissue and goes on to say that Mona can totally do better than Noel Kahn. She adds that if she’s become the Mona she wants to be, Noel Kahn shouldn’t get to define her. Mona smiles and says that Spencer isn’t just “book smart” but “smart smart” and thanks her as she walks way. This was precious!
Sara: I wish that Mona and Spencer would be best friends. They’re so good together!
Sweeney: Good or terrifying. Not sure, but they’d definitely run shit.
After the show, the middle aged plot device chats with Aria and Holden. She asks if Aria remembers Mr. Fitz, former teacher at her high school. Middle aged plot device says that he was there but had to leave ten minutes in because he didn’t feel well. Aria looks crushed that ~*fate*~ did not support her efforts.
Sara: Plus, Aria is rude as fuck throughout this entire conversation. Instead of listening at all, she keeps looking around trying find Ezra. If I was Holden, I would not be planning a second date.
Sweeney: Marin Manor. Hanna sits on the steps leaving Caleb a voice mail. Ashley made tea, and can tell that something is bothering Hanna, but decides to take her own advice and let Hanna talk to her in her own time. After she goes upstairs, Hanna leaves Caleb another message, apologizing for their fight earlier.
She hears a rattling noise at the back door and runs back there to see that it has blown open. Ashley calls downstairs, but Hanna says it’s just a broken latch on the door and locks it before going up stairs. Zoomy cameraman pans across the floor, though, and sees muddy footprints. After being panicky all day, Hanna didn’t even do a cursory scan of the kitchen for anything funny? Really?
Maya and Emily are standing in line to get into a club. Their light mood is interrupted by Maya’s phone going off and, once again, making her shifty. Emily tells her that she doesn’t need to explain and she can just tell her when she’s ready. The answer is now, apparently. Maya hooked up with someone while she was away, and she says that she was afraid that telling her would get in the way of this. Emily says it’s fine, since Maya says it’s over. Maya says it is, and groans that he won’t take no for an answer. Pronoun use gives Emily anxious face.
Holden and Aria talk outside the show and he calls her out on her Ezra Fitz crush, saying that he saw how she looked at him before and her sad puppy face after she learned he was gone. He plays the whole thing so adorably cool and I love him a little more up until the moment where he says it might be an opportunity and asks if she’s busy next Friday, which I take to mean he’s going to be a willing accomplice? PLEASE DON’T, HOLDEN.
Sara: WE LIKE YOU, HOLDEN. DON’T RUIN THIS.
Lor: This can’t be ruined for me at the moment. I’m just going to ENJOY how Holden noticed Aria’s stupid slow motion walk. LOL. Amazing.
Sweeney: Marin Manor. Hanna looks out her bedroom window at the storm. The shaky camera tells us she’s being watched through the door until Ashley calls her into the hall. While she’s standing outside the bathroom we see a shadowy figure duck into her room. She returns to her bedroom and the shadowy figure closes the door behind her. It’s Lucas, insisting that he never wanted to hurt her. She asks where Caleb is.
Segue Magic to downstairs, where he’s spotting the broken door latch. He also spots the still hot tea. We cut back and forth between Lucas being shifty and Caleb calling Hanna’s cell. He bursts through her door just as Lucas is shouting that he can’t let her leave that room. Does Ashley not hear this from the bathroom just down the hall?
Lucas finally confesses that he knew that Emily was going to out him as the crisis hotline caller, and he took her out to the lake to tell her alone. Additionally, she hoped that she would soften the blow when he confessed to Caleb. The secret, as it turns out, the money that Caleb left with Lucas until his return (because Wolfy Bad Boys hide things in cubby holes and crap instead of banks; maybe he could have asked Ashley if she had a pasta box to spare) is now all gone. Lucas blew $4,000 betting on a basketball tournament when a team got disqualified.
Sara: But… what…. why was he talking in that threatening voice for the past two episodes? Why is he saying she can’t leave the room? Why creepily row her out to the middle of the lake in the fog and dark? This… is stupid.
Lor: I LAUGHED SO HARD. OH MY GOD, THIS IS NOT FOR REAL. He’s not a murderer, he just gambles really murder-y like? WHAT IS THIS?
Sweeney: It’s the latest in tragically underwhelming reveals after a hardcore Toby edit. Either this is all bullshit or the set up was unforgivably misleading and stupid.
Lucas says that he ran away after the lake because he just wanted to make things right. He hands Caleb a wad of cash, which he says he got from selling all of his collectibles at comic book stores all over the state. MY FEELS. I know Lucas is whiny, and was behaving super shifty and maybe another! plot! twist! will reveal more, but HE SOLD ALL HIS COMIC BOOK STUFF. He’s a total outcast whose nerdom is his life’s only solace, so it hits me in the feels. Hanna’s only comments on the matter are that Lucas is not who she thought he was. Boo.
That night the girls are at Spencer’s processing this new information that Lucas was probably not behind any of the things they loudly accused him of so recently. Spencer busts out the visitor logbook and turns to the day before Ali went missing, which is supposedly the day that Ali showed up to blackmail Jenna. The log doesn’t show Ali signing in, but it does say that Garrett was there and signed Jenna out at 10:15, and could have been out all night.
As the girls speculate about where Jenna could have been, they open their Chinese food boxes to find it filled with worms and nastiness. Ew. (Except as everyone else pushes their food away, BAMF Spencer inspects it, looking for clues or something.)(S: 1430!) A text:
A-nonymous: I honestly have no idea what A is up to here. Some place with tarps and a climbable structure of some sort that’s bolted to the wall. A is loosening that bolt. I don’t care.
Lor: I think the we’re supposed to realize that someone will be falling to their doom soon? Fingers crossed for Ezra Fitz!
Sweeney: IF ONLY.
Next time: The Liars continue to pursue the evidence on the cell phone. We are now accepting bets for how quickly they’ll magically lose it on Pretty Little Liars S02 E17 – Blond Leading the Blind.
Nicole is the co-captain of Snark Squad and these days she spends most of her time editing podcasts. She spends too much time on Twitter and very occasionally vlogs and blogs. In her day job she's a producer, editor, director, and sometimes host of educational YouTube channels. She loves travel, maps, panda gifs, and semicolons. Writing biographies stresses her out; she crowd sourced this one years ago and has been using a version of it ever since. She would like to thank Twitter for their help.
I'm a 30-something south Floridan who loves the beach but cannot swim. Such is my life, full of small contradictions and little trivialities. My main life goals are never to take life too seriously, but to do everything I attempt seriously well. After that, my life goals devolve into things like not wearing pants and eating all of the Zebra Cakes in the world. THE WORLD.
I'm a 30-something with three kids who spends an embarrassing amount of time watching teen television dramas. There's a whole lot of Internet out there, and I plan on reading all of it before I die.
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